Tag Archives: LTUE

For every single person the path leading to fulfillment and success looks different. Some prefer small consistent goals, some crave the big marathon push, and then there’s Jared Quan. Known around the Utah writing community as the guy who gets stuff done (and never sleeps), he often shares his favorite quote:

“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Jared is the champion of volunteering. Every year he donates countless hours, well into the hundreds, giving his time, his ideas, and his drive to the organizations he loves. Today, he shares his story with us.

I Rolled a Life Changing 20 and You Can Too.

By: Jared Quan

Four years ago, my second book “Changing Wax” was published.
I had accomplished my lifelong dream, and no one had any idea who I was.
Getting published was a massive struggle that took nine years to happen, and I
was exhausted. Antsy to do something, but not ready to take on another book, I
had an epiphany. I would use my knowledge and experience to make it my mission
to help people achieve their dreams. I had no idea what that single decision
would lead to.

After talking it through with my wife and we figured out
that I could volunteer a couple hours a week. I went out looking for ways to get
involved. Which was not nearly as easy as it sounded. I stumbled into my first
opportunity after taking a shot in the dark and emailing the Mayor of West
Jordan. Mayor Rolfe recommend that I join the West Jordan Arts Council. Shortly
after I was appointed to the West Jordan Arts Council by the West Jordan city
council. Serving on the Literary Committee under an amazing Literary Arts Chair
John Pulver, I started to learn the ropes on how to do more in the community.

At the exact same time this was happening I met Johnny
Worthen who recommend that I check out the League of Utah Writers. During my
very first meeting with the Oquirrh Chapter it was announced by Chapter
President Eliza Crosby that they needed a new Vice President, after a massive
internal debate (and texts from my wife encouraging me to volunteer), I
volunteered. Under Eliza, I was starting to learn about how the League worked
and what things I could do to help.

I worked on a few projects with the Arts Council and the
League which embolden me to find some additional small projects. I volunteered
to help author David Armstrong at the Davis County Fair, volunteered to help acclaimed
artist Roger Whiting at the DIY Festival, helped staff the League table at LTUE
and Storymakers. I started to figure out how much time I could spend on
projects and started to figure out how to better utilize the resources I have
access to.

Fast forward to today, after dozens and dozens of projects,
and events, I am now on five non-profit boards (League of Utah Writers,
Storymakers, Cultural Arts Society of West Jordan, Eagle Mountain Arts
Alliance, and Big World Network), I work four jobs (VLCM, Lyft, Real Salt Lake,
and being an author), and spend time with my wife and five kids. My mission
transformed into a passion, and then into a dream. I get to help people every
day reach their dreams.

As you can see, I didn’t get into volunteering to gain
position or rewards other than seeing people succeed. However, I discovered
that volunteering selflessly was like rolling a 20-sided dice over and over.
The number would randomly throw unexpected rewards. The key being that the service
had to be selfless.

Like a waking dream I found myself sitting in front of
hundreds of people at the LTUE conference 2019. I was sitting off to the side
waiting for my turn to be a special guest with the Writing Excuses Podcast. I
had rolled a 20, and I was being honored with a tremendous opportunity. I knew
however, that even in this moment, it wasn’t about me, it was an opportunity to
help others find ways to figure out what I had found out.

I watch as special guest Natasha Ence and Rosalyn Collings
Eves, do an amazing job on the podcast. Then it was my turn to sit with the
amazing team of Brandon Sanderson, Dan Wells, Mary Robinette Kowal, and Howard
Tayler. We talked about volunteering and ways to find opportunities to
volunteer. It was amazing.

When people had found out that I had selected to be on
Writing Excuses, everyone asked how I had accomplished such a thing. I told
people that I wasn’t sure, but I was honored to have such an opportunity, and
talk about selflessly volunteering.

Everyday I wake up and live my dream of helping people. If you add the goal, mission or passion of helping people by volunteering (not just in the writing community), you will be rolling a 20 side dice that will change your life. It will help you accomplish amazing things and give you opportunities beyond your imagination. I have to thank all the amazing people for giving me the chance to volunteer and taking a chance on me. You just have to take a chance on yourself and volunteer. I would love to see you out there.

Intrepid leader and Energizer bunny, Jared Quan

About today’s guest –

Jared Quan is a video game addict and writer published in genres from Spy-Thriller to Horror/Supernatural, to Fantasy-Comedy. His work includes Ezekial’s Gun, Changing Wax, Classified, Pathological Passion, (Futuristic/Romance/Steampunk, which he co-wrote with his wife), Unclassified, and Prepped (a story in the Apocalypse Utah anthology).

He has extensively served the community in roles from the President for the League of Utah Writers, Board Member of the Cultural Arts Society of West Jordan, Grants Director of the Eagle Mountain Arts Alliance, Executive Director of Big World Network, Chair of the West Jordan Arts Council, serving on the Utah Poet Laureate Selection Committee, Recruiting Chair of the Association of IT Professional Utah Chapter, as well as serving as a general volunteer for countless events and organizations.

Jared was given the Gold Volunteer Service Award by the President of the United States for his over 1,500 hours of service to the writing community from 2015 to 2017. He has also received recognition and awards from the Governor and Lt. Governor of Utah for his volunteering.

He lives in Eagle Mountain with his supportive wife and five children.

Want to connect? It’s easy!

About Jared’s Book, Changing Wax

Changing Wax is an action adventure comedy, taking place in the fantasy world of Wax, which resides just seven hundred sixty-two thousand, five hundred twenty-two million and five light years from Earth (give or take half a light year depending on Earth’s rotation). Wax revolves around rules established in the ancient Master Book of Magic, rules that don’t always follow basic logic or sanity. The story follows three adventurers: Gorath the misfortunate monk who can’t seem to get anything right, Odd Drip the Imp who is too smart for his own good, and Thomas Twostead, a teenage girl born on the wrong side of Wax’s never-ending war between Light and Dark. In the end, their teaming up might decide the fate of the world, while seemingly defying the will of the Master Book of Magic. Or are they…?

New Anthology Release!

Tales of wise, ancient dragons hoarding treasure, terrorizing villages, and doing battle with noble heroes have long fascinated us. But dragons were not born old and wise, nor were heroes born brave and noble.Wings of Change gathers tales of young dragons growing into their scales and claws, and human youths making choices that shape their destinies – destinies that will be forever changed by their interaction with the dragons that share their world.

My story “Saffron Dragon” is about a blind Bangladeshi girl who discovers a dragon lives in her dreams. She must learn to both trust herself and the dragon to find her place in the world.

Today we are privileged to have my dear friend and fellow fantasy author, Candace J Thomas, here on the blog. Candace has been my cheerleader and spirit animal from the first day we spent time together behind Xchyler Publishing’s sales table at the 2015 Life, the Universe, and Everything Symposium. At that point, she embodied everything I wanted to be. She had two amazing books and was working on the third, she radiated warmth and confidence, and she knew the industry.

My big question for her is:

How has creating new worlds and characters changed your world view?

Candace’s answer:

This is a beautiful question.

There are two answers that I came up with.

My first answer – It’s all in the details. I am an observer of life. I’ve always been a people-watcher. People fascinate me, their mannerisms, drives, motivations. When building characters, I focus on these kind of things and strive to make them real, as real as if I knew them in high school.

Also, as an observer, the world becomes a more vivid and interesting place. I search for the interesting peculiarities to bring a more human experience – or basically, the Charm of things.

Currently, I am writing a story that takes place in Chicago. When I visited, there were little things I noticed, like how sidewalks wind around where trees are planted. It’s a charming fact that makes it interesting and human. Maybe the casual reader wouldn’t notice such a little detail, but I find it fulfilling and necessary to my stories. Adding charm is attractive to me.

When in Austin, I saw a side wall outside of bar completely littered with industrial staples where band flyers once hung. I admired the dreams that once were and wondered what happened to the thousands of dreams that came and went.

Nature is a big fascination to me. I like the veins in leaves and how they change color. I like watching fuzzy caterpillars slink across the tree branches, just wandering about their day. I like broken sidewalks and aged cobblestone. As an author, I have a responsibility to bring an experience to the reader. If I don’t add the little details, the bits of charm, I feel like I’m failing. You can find little details in everything I write.

As to the second answer – being an author, in general, has changed my world view. I’m a simple person, with a very simple idea of life, but I am driven by creativity. I view things differently and communicate in the language of art. I am also dyslexic, but that never changed my desire to be creative and write. It did bring challenges and insecurities to what I was trying to do.

I have always ached to be a writer and had the drive to do it and be successful. There are pros and cons to authoring. Becoming an author has pushed my private writing public. It takes me out of my comfort zone and brings this out-going character to the stage. As an author, there is no hiding your mistakes and insecurities in writing. It’s out there for readers, and every reader has an opinion.

I’ve had to learn that not everyone loves reading fantasy, and not everyone will like what I’ve done. I’ve really grown and matured over the last five years being published. I’ve become a confident author and mentor to others. I’m much wiser and more conscientious about how my name, as a brand, is perceived. It’s like I took the blue pill in the Matrix and I can never view the world as general as I did before. But on the flipside, I get to influence readers and creators every time they open my books. That is the very best feeling in the world.

Candace J Thomas is an award-winning of Young Adult Fantasy and Sci-fi. She is the author of the Vivatera Series and Hawkweed, published by Xchyler Publishing. Her debut novel Vivatera won the LUW Diamond Award for Novel of the Year. Her Paranormal Satire, Vampire-ish: A Hypochondriac’s Tale, was published July 2016.

The 2017 Utah writing conference season kicks off with the ever popular, and oh-so-affordable “Life, the Universe, and Everything” symposium on science fiction and fantasy. I’ve attended this particular conference a handful of times as a hopeful starry-eyed participant in the past.

However, this year for the first time ever, they let me play with the big kids. That’s right, yours truly got to be an expert panelist. If that wasn’t exciting enough, I got to be a panel moderator as well, which is a huge first.

It’s hard not to read too deeply into the committee’s choice to include me, a mere short storyist. My qualifications as an author are still a bit thin. There are so many super talented and super published authors in Utah that you can’t throw a rock without hitting one. I’d love to say I was picked because they had seen some of my presentation work before and they were impressed.

The truth is, I apparently have in-depth knowledge of several obscure fields of study, knowledge that most gals in my position don’t have. I also volunteered to be part of several obscure panels. My first panel discussed the realities of what happens at death. I haven’t personally died yet, so my experience is limited there. I’m holding off on trying it out until it goes on sale. Instead, I have worked in health care for both humans and animals and seen plenty of death that way. My fellow panelists included a firefighter, a seasoned RN and personal friend, a physicians assistant obsessed with cellular biology, and the moderator who I still haven’t figured out the background on. In fairness, he’s still puzzling out mine.

The other panel centered on the visual comedy of Rowan Atkinson. I know, I laughed too. death goes so well with visual comedy. On the panel was the founder of the LTUE conference itself, Dave Doering, and the TMA track head, Nick Mills, and another guy who apparently spent his childhood the precisely the same way I spent mine, watching late night PBS when all the British comedies came on. Yes, I didn’t have that many friends, why do you ask? Needless to say, having two fairly influential people on the panel stressed me out to no end.

To sum up – I had a great time and I believe that my panels went well. I wanted to attend a few other panels and perhaps glean a few nuggets of new writerly wisdom, but instead I hung around with writing friends instead, which honestly is the best part of the conference anyway.

A huge shout out to the following awesome people who let me play and were kind enough to let me hang out with them: Jared Quan, President of the League of Utah Writers; Candace Thomas, Eliza Crosby (who got a full manuscript request – you go girl!), Sarah Seeley, Chris Roche, DawnRay Ammon, Jenna Eatough, and all my other LTUE talented friends!

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